Tavoris Cloud is looking to come back
Boxing has been getting a ray of sunshine lately with news of fights returning in June, as promised by Top Rank’s head honcho Bob Arum.
Then there has been news of former undisputed heavyweights/hall of fame champions “Iron” Mike Tyson (50-6, 44ko) and Evander “Real Deal” Holyfield (44-10-2, 29ko) possibly coming back for an exhibition bout.
Even 55-year-old former WBC champion Oliver “The Atomic Bull” McCall (59-14, 38ko), jumped in calling out “Iron” Mike. Then of course WBA “super” welterweight champion Manny “Pac Man” Pacquiao (62-7-2, 39ko) continues to defy father time.
So it shouldn’t surprise anyone that another former champion has announced wanting to return to the squared circle. Former IBF light heavyweight champion Tavoris “Thunder” Cloud (24-3, 19ko) wants to jump back into the ring for one last run.
BETTER FOR THE BREAK
The former Florida champion spoke with Curran Bhatia of Ask The Experts, about returning to the ring after a six-year hiatus.
“Most definitely I want to come back and every time I do it, there is always something that gets in the way. But I’ll be back in a few months. Probably when everything slows down with this quarantine, I’ll be back.”
Thunder would elaborate on his long layoff and give a guarantee that it will be this year.
“I wanted to take some time off, I never said retire or just completely quit, you know. I took three losses in a row so I figured that it’s time to sit down and rethink the game plan. I’ll be back this year, it’s just some other reasons that I couldn’t be in there. I really don’t want to talk about but I’ll be back. I am not going to give no definite dates but I will be back this year guaranteed.”
The 38-year-old former Florida champion understands that his advanced age is cause for concern. However, he explains why now is the time.
“I’ll be doing things a lot smarter, but I don’t feel old. I took care of myself, I have been fighting my whole life training and things like that. It’s going to be better for me. Even with my fighting style, I had the opportunity to go back study myself and make myself better, work on a lot of weakness that I had as a fighter.”
“Everything is clear to me now. Sometimes you need the lights, camera, and action to stop. You need the fall from grace to find yourself again and I definitely did that.”
It definitely seems that the time away has done some good mentally and physically for the former champion and if there is one thing about this sport, its that anything can happen. Given the wealth of talent in the light heavyweight division, it will be interesting to see if the old champion has one great fight left in him.
By: Garrisson Bland
